SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS

This information was compiled by Colombian government
investigators and Human Rights Watch. Several of our sources, including
eyewitnesses, requested anonymity because their lives have been under threat
as a result of their testimony.

Far from moving decisively to sever ties to paramilitaries,
Human Rights Watch's evidence strongly suggests that Colombia's military
high command has yet to take the necessary steps to accomplish this goal.
Human Rights Watch's information implicates Colombian Army brigades operating
in the country's three largest cities, including the capital, Bogotá. If Colombia's leaders cannot or will not halt these units' support for paramilitary groups, the government's resolve to end human rights abuse in units that receive U.S. security assistance must be seriously questioned.

Previous Human Rights Watch reports and documents
have detailed credible and compelling evidence contained in government
and other investigations of continuing ties between the military and paramilitary
groups in the Fifth, Seventh, Ninth, Fourteenth, and Seventeenth Brigades.

Together, evidence collected so far by Human Rights
Watch links half of Colombia's eighteen brigade-level army units (excluding
military schools) to paramilitary activity. These units operate in all
of Colombia's five divisions. In other words, military support for paramilitary
activity remains national in scope and includes areas where units receiving
or scheduled to receive U.S. military aid operate.

Human Rights Watch has drawn this information to
the attention of the appropriate Colombian government ministers and officials,
and has urged them to take immediate action to address these continuing
problems in accordance with existing Colombian law.

Based on the enclosed evidence, Human Rights Watch
found that:

As recently as 1999, Colombian government investigators
gathered compelling evidence that Army officers set up a "paramilitary"
group using active duty, retired, and reserve duty military officers along
with hired paramilitaries who effectively operated alongside Army soldiers
and in collaboration with them;

In 1997, 1998, and 1999, a thorough Colombian government
investigation collected compelling evidence that Army officers worked intimately
with paramilitaries under the command of Carlos Castaño. They shared intelligence, planned and carried out joint operations, provided weapons and munitions, supported with helicopters and medical aid, and coordinated on a day to
day basis. Some of the officers involved remain on active duty and in command
of troops;

There is credible evidence, obtained through Colombian
government investigations and Human Rights Watch interviews, that in 1998
and 1999, Army intelligence agents gathered information on Colombians associated
with human rights protection, government investigative agencies, and peace
talks, who were then subjected to threats, harassment, and attacks by the
army, at times with the assistance of paramilitary groups and hired killers;

There is credible evidence that this alliance between
military intelligence, paramilitary groups, and hired killers is national
in scope and is able to threaten key investigators in the Attorney General's
office and the Procuraduría;

The brigades discussed here -- the Third, Fourth, and
Thirteenth -- operate in Colombia's largest cities, including the capital.
Their commanders are considered among the most capable and intelligent,
and are leading candidates for promotion to positions of overall command
of divisions, the Army, and Colombia's joint forces. If Colombia's leaders
cannot or will not halt support for paramilitary groups in these units,
it is highly questionable to assume that they will be more successful in
units that are less scrutinized or operate in rural areas, including units
that receive U.S. security assistance in southern Colombia;

As these cases underline, Colombia's civilian investigative
agencies, in particular the Attorney General's office, are capable of sophisticated
and hard-hitting investigations. However, many investigators assigned to
cases that implicate the Army and paramilitaries have been forced to resign
or to flee Colombia;

At least seven officers mentioned in the attached report
are School of the Americas graduates. Training alone, even when it includes
human rights instruction, does not prevent human rights abuses. It must
be accompanied by by clear and determined action on the part of the Colombian
government to bring to justice those in the military who have committed
human rights abuses, to force the military to break longstanding ties to
paramilitary groups, and to ensure that the Colombian Armed Forces are
subject to the rule of law, including the August 1997 Constitutional Court
decision that mandates that security force personnel accused of committing
crimes against humanity are tried in civilian courts.

All international security assistance should be conditioned
on explicit actions by the Colombian Government to sever links, at all
levels, between the Colombian military and paramilitary groups. Abuses
directly attributed to members of the Colombian military have decreased
in recent years, but over the same period the number and scale of abuses
attributed to paramilitary groups operating with the military's acquiescence
or open support have skyrocketed. International assistance should not be
provided either to those who directly commit human rights abuses or to
those who effectively contract others to carry out abuses on their behalf.

The actions that the Colombian government should
be required to take include:

devising and implementing a comprehensive and public
plan to investigate, pursue, capture, and bring to justice paramilitary
leaders, one that provides sufficient resources and guarantees the necessary
political support to accomplish these goals;

providing a significant increase of funding for the
Attorney General's Human Rights Unit, including increased support for the
Witness Protection program, travel, communications equipment, increased
security, and improved evidence-gathering capability. The work of Colombia's
Attorney General's office has contributed significantly to the protection
of human rights and accountability for serious crimes, including crimes
committed by Colombia's guerrillas. Yet prosecutors and investigators continue
to run deadly risks. Many have been forced to leave the country because
of threats against their lives, leaving the fate of crucial cases in jeopardy;

establishing the ability at the regional and local level
to respond to threats of massacres and targeted violence, including the
creation of a rapid reaction force to investigate threats and killings,
and to take steps to pursue and apprehend alleged perpetrators in order
to bring them to justice;

With regard to U.S. training of Colombian military
and police, Human Rights Watch urges the international community to ensure
that:

all U.S. advice and training includes detailed instruction
regarding the obligation of all members of the military and security forces
to uphold Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions and Protocol II. Training
should include hypothetical situations that reflect Colombian reality,
and students should be closely evaluated on their understanding and application
of international humanitarian law. Specialists from the International Committee
of the Red Cross should be invited to contribute to such training;

all existing training materials are reviewed in coordination
with representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross, the
Defensora del Pueblo, the office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human
Rights, the Colombian Attorney General, and a representative of independent
human rights groups, to ensure that they reflect the highest standards
of protection for human rights and international humanitarian law;

all trainees, whether of officer rank or below, receive
appropriate instruction in human rights and international humanitarian
law.

The information submitted by Human Rights Watch shows
clearly that intelligence-sharing remains the most pervasive and common
method of collaboration between the Colombian military and paramilitary
groups, with grave consequences for human rights. Intelligence is by definition
a central function of any army, and is clearly so in the case of the Colombian
military. Addressing the problems such information-sharing poses defies
a unit-by-unit approach. Therefore:

observing the aim of the Leahy Amendment, the United
States should apply human rights conditions to all intelligence-sharing,
to ensure that information is neither shared with human rights abusers
nor with those who will pass it to paramilitary groups that violate human
rights;

for the purposes of compliance with the Leahy Amendment,
the United States should make it clear that aiding and abetting any paramilitary
group would result in a unit being disqualified for receipt of further
U.S. aid or training effective measures are taken to investigate and punish
violations;

any increase in security assistance should mean a proportionate
increase in civilian staff assigned to the U.S. Embassy and State Department
to oversee compliance with human rights conditions. Staff should be required
to meet frequently with not only military and government sources of information,
but also independent human rights groups, the church, and aid organizations.
The goal must be to gather as much information as possible about reported
human rights violations;

a report on monitoring activities in countries where
the Leahy Amendment applies should be a regular part of the State Department's
annual report on human rights and should be available for independent review.

The "effective measures" set out in the Leahy Amendment
should be interpreted to include, among other measures, the rigorous application
of the August 1997 ruling of Colombia's Constitutional Court, which requires
that crimes against humanity allegedly committed by military personnel
be investigated and tried in civilian courts. Neither the military nor
the Superior Judicial Council charged with resolving jurisdictional disputes
have abided by this ruling to date.

as a condition of U.S. security assistance, the Government
of Colombia should first require the military to respect civilian jurisdiction
in cases involving credible allegations of human rights abuse by military
personnel, including cases where officers are accused of conspiring to
commit or facilitate murders and massacres by paramilitary groups. In this
way, President Pastrana can ensure that such cases are sent to civilian
courts, best equipped to investigate them impartially and guarantee due
process;

the United States should require that the Colombian
military set up an independent review committee, composed of high level
representatives from the Attorney General's office and the office of the
Procuraduría, to assess whether there is credible evidence of human rights
abuse against individual officers and soldiers. If such credible evidence
is found, the individual should be immediately suspended and the case sent
to the civilian courts for prosecution. If found guilty, the individual
should be permanently dismissed from the security forces;

to reinforce sanctions on abusive security force members,
the United States should conduct a review of all visas granted to military
personnel and ensure that individuals against whom there is credible evidence
of human rights abuse or support for paramilitary groups have their visas
revoked or are denied visas to enter the United States;

to strengthen accountability, the United States must
urge Colombia to reform the rules governing investigations and disciplinary
proceedings carried out by the Procuraduría. The Procuraduría is the government agency that oversees the conduct of government employees, including members of the military and police, and can order them sanctioned or dismissed.
Currently, however, delays in investigation mean that many investigations
into serious human rights crimes must be shelved due to excessively short
statutes of limitations. Also, the crime of murder is not included as a
reason for dismissal. Even when the Procuraduría finds that a member of
the security forces has committed murder, it can recommend no more stringent
punishment than a "severe reprimand," simply a letter in the individual's
employment file;

the United States must require that Colombia void the
statute of limitations for investigations into crimes against humanity
and other, related human rights violations.

Further, the international community should urge Colombia
to pass and rigorously enforce laws that protect human rights including
laws penalizing forced disappearance, unlawful detention, and torture.
Legislation that officially recognizes and supports the work of the Attorney
General's Human Rights Unit should also be supported by the foreign embassies
in Bogotá.

Human rights defenders are among the most at-risk
groups in Colombia. The international community should support their work
by increasing funding for non-governmental groups that apply for international
assistance. Funds should help strengthen their ability to investigate and
report on human rights violations.

The international community should provide increased
funding for Colombia's forcibly displaced, not only those who may be forced
to abandon their homes because of future coca eradication efforts. Currently
Colombia ranks third in the world in terms of the number of forcibly displaced
people. Aid should be channeled through the church and independent aid
and human rights groups rather than the government, in view of the latter's
previous failure to follow through with promised assistance.

COLOMBIA AND MILITARY-PARAMILITARY LINKS

Half of Colombia's eighteen brigade-level army
units (excluding military schools) have documented links to paramilitary
activity

THIRD BRIGADE (headquarters
in Cali, Valle);

"The Calima Front and the Third Brigade are
the same thing."

Colombian government investigator

Colombian government investigators and Human Rights
Watch interviews include compelling, detailed information that in 1999,
the Colombian Army's Third Brigade set up a "paramilitary" group in the
department of Valle del Cauca, in southern Colombia. The investigators
identify this group by its self-imposed name, the Calima Front (Frente
Calima), and told Human Rights Watch that they were able to link the group
to active duty, retired, and reserve military officers attached to the
Third Brigade along with hired paramilitaries taken from the ranks of the
Peasant Self-Defense Group of Córdoba and Urabá (Autodefensas Campesinas de Córdoba y Urabá, ACCU), commanded by Carlos Castaño. According to these government investigators as well as eyewitness testimony obtained by Human Rights Watch, the Third Brigade provided the Calima Front with weapons and intelligence.

At the time these events took place, the Third Brigade
was under the command of Brig. Gen. Jaime Ernesto Canal Albán, where he
remains to this day.(1)

Our information is based on interviews with Attorney
General investigators who prepared documents for an on-going government
investigation that is currently under seal (bajo reserva); an investigator
from an independent organization; other investigators; and "Elias," a former
Army intelligence agent who also served as a cartel gunman. "Elias" also
testified under oath to Attorney General investigators. "Elias" told Human
Rights Watch and government investigators that he worked for the army's
"Coronel Agustín Codazzi" Battalion in Palmira, part of the Third Brigade.(2)

The Third Brigade is part of the Colombian Army's
Third Division, which includes a region where military units receiving
a large amount of U.S. security assistance are concentrated.(3)

According to the government investigator Human Rights
Watch interviewed who helped prepare the official investigation, the Calima
Front was formed in response to a mass kidnaping carried out by guerrillas
belonging to the José María Becerra Front of the National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional, ELN). On May 30, 1999, guerrillas seized about 140 worshipers from Cali's La María Church. Among those taken were suspected drug traffickers believed to run part of the business established by the jailed Cali Cartel leaders.(4) Guerrillas demanded ransoms for some of the hostages, a serious violation of the laws of war.(5)

In response, "Elias" told Human Rights Watch, Third
Brigade active duty and reserve officers formed the Calima Front, with
the assistance of Carlos Castaño. Active duty officers provided intelligence
and logistical support. Former military officers were among those called
in to assume positions of command. The troops were made up primarily of
paramilitaries brought in from Colombia's north. The men were initially
lodged on ranches belonging to suspected drug traffickers, who also contributed
resources to equip and feed the men.(6)

The connection between drug traffickers and paramilitary
groups is not new and has been well documented in reporting by the U.S.
Embassy in Bogotáá since at least 1990.(7)

"Elias" told Human Rights Watch that during his employment
as an intelligence agent, he witnessed close links between drug traffickers,
paramilitaries, and the Army. Among other illegal practices, "Elias" said
that Codazzi Battalion soldiers routinely sold weapons and munitions captured
from guerrillas on the black market. The money raised, he said, went to
soldiers and to fund illegal activities. "Elias" said that he was paid
according to operations generated by his information, in part supplemented
by the battalion's illegal weapons sales.(8)

"Elias" said he also worked for local drug traffickers,
and served as a body guard on the ranch of one drug trafficker who frequently
hosted Third Brigade troops and paramilitaries. In his interview, he described
the distinction between drug traffickers, paramilitaries, and the Colombian
Army as virtually non-existent. His services were valuable, he told Human
Rights Watch, since he maintained close ties to the Army and could serve
as a shared intelligence agent for all three groups. "The salary was $800
a month if I worked with [the paramilitaries] without going on maneuvers
and $1,300 if I went into the field," "Elias" told Human Rights Watch.(9)

In July, local officials and the regional ombudsman
(Defensora) began receiving reports from local residents of the appearance
of the "Calima Front." Over the August 1 weekend, armed men reportedly
killed four peasants near Tulu.(10) According
to press reports, the group, estimated to include at least 150 men wearing
army-style uniforms, carried AK-47s, M-60s, grenades, and the latest communications
equipment. Despite abundant reports of their presence, their movements
went virtually unimpeded for weeks.(11)

In August, "Elias" testified to Attorney General
investigators in Bogotá about his contact with the Calima Front. Investigators told Human Rights Watch that they corroborated his testimony over the following weeks, as the killings and massacres he warned had been planned by the
Calima Front in conjunction with Third Brigade officers progressed.(12)

Subsequently, allegations of a connection between
the Calima Front and Third Brigade surfaced publicly, when the ELN charged
Army complicity in a statement released with a group of La María hostages.(13)
Human Rights Watch interviewed an independent investigator who was able
to confirm the Calima Front's existence and give additional information
in October 1999.(14)

By August 5, the first of hundreds of displaced people
began to arrive in towns like Tulu, San Pedro, and Buga. Many told stories
similar to the one Abelardo Trejos gave to a reporter from the Cali-based El
País. Armed men had blocked the roads, so Trejos, his wife, and two
children fled on a foot path. "[The armed men] told me that we had to leave,
because there was going to be a tremendous war and that I should return
when it was all over."(15)

On August 7, armed men seized Noralba Gaviria Piedrahíta, a community leader, bound her, then led her to the outskirts of Ceylán, near Bugalagrande, and executed her.(16)
On September 22, authorities discovered the mutilated and dismembered bodies
of seven men near Tulu, apparently executed by the Calima Front for suspected
ties to guerrillas.(17)

Despite abundant evidence of illegal activity, throughout
the summer the Army claimed that the murders and forced displacement were
"unconfirmed." Maj. Gen. Jaime Humberto Cortés Parada, commander of the
Cali-based Third Division, blamed deaths on the Revolutionary Armed Forces
of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, FARC), which
in his words was seeking to "generate chaos and disinformation."(18)

In Tulu, where a community stadium was providing
emergency shelter, the number of displaced families fast outgrew available
resources. The press reported that at night, men on motorbikes fired shots
into the air and shouted threats at the displaced civilians, whom they
accused of being guerrilla sympathizers.(19)
By September, local officials estimated that at least 40 people had been
killed and over 2,000 were forcibly displaced.(20)

Meanwhile, both "Elias" and the government investigators
handling the case told Human Rights Watch that they began to receive death
threats.(21) Although government investigators
told Human Rights Watch that they put "Elias" under protective custody,
the threats continued. "Elias" told us there were two attempts on his life.(22)
The government investigators handling the case and one other observer contacted
by authorities to assist in the investigation told Human Rights Watch that
they were also threatened. (23) "Elias"
and several Attorney General investigators later fled Colombia.(24)

All agree, in the words of one investigator, that
"the Calima Front and the Third Brigade are the same thing."(25)

This pattern of activity differs little from previous
cases documented in Colombian court proceedings, where the Third Brigade,
paramilitaries, and drug traffickers allied to attack suspected guerrillas
and civilians and commit atrocities. Between 1988 and 1990, for example,
traffickers allied with police and Third Brigade officers perpetrated the
over 100 killings known collectively as the Trujillo massacre. President
Ernesto Samper subsequently acknowledged the government's role in carrying
out these killings and covering up its responsibility on January 31, 1995.(26)

Another atrocity linked to the Third Brigade was
the 1993 Riofrío massacre. On October 5, thirteen members of the Ladino
family living in Riofrío, Valle del Cauca, were murdered by a combined force
of Third Brigade soldiers and paramilitaries.(27)

More recently, the Third Brigade has been implicated
in the Monteloro massacre of five people on November 8, 1998. According
to an independent investigation, troops from the "Palacé" Battalion, based
in Buga, and the "Numancia" Counterguerrilla Battalion killed five civilians
as they celebrated the fifteenth birthday party of the daughter of the
owner of the house they were in. Several of the witnesses have since been
killed in circumstances that suggest an attempt to cover up the crime.(28)

"When we would deliver a guerrilla to the Girardot
Battalion, they would give us in exchange grenades and R-15 munitions . . .
And after the Army received (the corpse), they would dress it in a military
uniform."

Francisco Enrique Villalba Hernández, a former
paramilitary

The Attorney General's office has collected extensive
evidence of pervasive ties in 1997, 1998, and 1999 between the Fourth Brigade
and paramilitaries under the command of Carlos Castaño. These documents
name the Girardot, Granaderos, Héroes de Barbacoas, Juan del Corral Battalions, and Pedro Nel Ospina Battalions as well as Fourth Brigade headquarters.

The investigation describes activities that occurred
while the Fourth Brigade was under the command of Gen. Alfonso Manosalva
(since deceased) and subsequently, Gen. Carlos Ospina Ovalle, since promoted
and now head of Colombia's Fourth Division.(29)
In his current post, General Ospina is the divisional commander of at least
one of the units proposed to receive U.S. security assistance, the Twelfth
Brigade, based in Florencia, Caquetá.(30)

In 1998, the Attorney General opened an investigation
of alleged atrocities committed the previous year by paramilitaries around
the town of Girardota, Tarazá, and Caucasia, in the department of Antioquia.
Investigators concluded that a group of so-called "paramilitaries" included
six active-duty soldiers assigned to the Batallón de Infantera No. 10 "Girardot" and the Batallón de Ingenieros No. 4 "Pedro Nel Ospina." In the official investigation, the group was linked to a series of killings and robberies
committed while they were dressed in Army uniforms and carrying their Army-issue
weapons, including machine guns and grenades. In so-called "social cleansing"
operations, the group attacked and killed individuals believed to be drug
addicts or thieves.(31)

Among the alleged paramilitaries Attorney General
investigators told Human Rights Watch enjoyed free access to Fourth Brigade
headquarters in 1997 and 1998 was Jacinto Alberto Soto, known as "Lucas"
and believed to act as the ACCU's accountant. In 1998, the Attorney General
issued an arrest warrant for Soto and seized him in possession of ACCU
documents and ledgers. Nevertheless, authorities told Human Rights Watch
that Soto apparently bribed his way out of the front door of Medellín's
maximum security prison weeks later.(32)

In a separate series of investigations, Attorney
General prosecutors collected abundant evidence linking the Fourth Brigade
to the paramilitaries under Castaño's command who carried out the El Aro
massacre, which took place in October 1997. At the time, General Ospina
commanded the Fourth Brigade. These documents show that on October 25,
a joint army-paramilitary force surrounded the village of El Aro and the
2,000 people who live in and around it. The operation was part of a region-wide
offensive launched against the FARC and designed to force residents to
abandon villages identified as providing FARC guerrillas with supplies
and "conquer" the region, in the words of Castaño.(33)

Survivors told Human Rights Watch that while soldiers
maintained a perimeter around El Aro, an estimated twenty-five ACCU members
entered the village, rounded up residents, and executed four people in
the plaza. One witness told Human Rights Watch that the ACCU leaders were
men who called themselves "Cobra" and "Junior." Witnesses said that paramilitaries
told store owner Aurelio Areiza and his family to slaughter a steer and
prepare food from their shelves to feed the ACCU fighters on October 25
and 26, while the rest of Colombia voted in municipal elections. The next
day, witnesses told Human Rights Watch, paramilitaries took Areiza to a
nearby house, tied him to a tree, then tortured and killed him. They added
that the ACCU gouged out Arieza's eyes and cut off his tongue and testicles.(34)

One witness told journalists who visited El Aro soon
afterwards that families who attempted to flee were turned back by soldiers
camped on the outskirts of town. Over the five days they remained in El
Aro, ACCU members were believed to have executed at least eleven people,
including three children, burned forty-seven of the sixty-eight houses,
including a pharmacy, a church, and the telephone exchange, looted stores,
destroyed the pipes that fed the homes potable water, and forced most of
the residents to flee. When they left on October 30, the ACCU took with
them over 1,000 head of cattle along with goods looted from homes and stores.(35) Afterwards, thirty people were reported to be forcibly disappeared.(36)

By year's end, hundreds of displaced families were
divided between shelters in Ituango, Puerto Valdivia, and Medellín.(37) Jesús Valle, an Ituango town councilman, lawyer, and president of the "Héctor Abad Gómez" Permanent Human Rights Committee, helped document the massacre
and represented some families of victims. He was assassinated in his Medellín
office on February 27, 1998. Carlos Castaño, the Army, and local drug traffickers
are currently under investigation for planning his murder.(38)
Government investigators have linked the hired killers to La Terraza, a
group of professional assassins that works on contract for Castaño.(39)

In sworn testimony to Attorney General investigators
taken on April 30, 1998, Francisco Enrique Villalba Hernández, a former
paramilitary who took part in the El Aro massacre, confirmed the testimony
by survivors taken by Human Rights Watch that the operation had been carefully
planned and carried out by a joint paramilitary-Army force. Villalba said
he belonged to the Toledo Group within the ACCU's Metro Front. He told
authorities that "Junior" and Salvatore Mancuso, known as "El Mono Mancuso"
and the commander of ACCU fighters present, took him and approximately
100 other paramilitaries to Puerto Valdivia to prepare to enter El Aro.(40)

There, Villalba told authorities that he witnessed
the meeting between Mancuso, an Army lieutenant, and two Army subordinates,
there with troops. This region is covered by both the Girardot and Granaderos
Battalions. Throughout the encounter, Villalba testified, Army soldiers
and paramilitaries addressed each other as "cousin" (primo), as
a sign of shared goals and purpose.(41)Villalba
was also able to testify about radio exchanges he overheard between Mancuso
and the colonel in charge of the battalion that was taking part in the
combined operation. According to Villalba, "They were planning the entry
into El Aro and how the operation would go lower down (the mountain), so
that the Army would prevent people or commissions or journalists from entering."(42)

During the operation, Villalba said that the combined
Army-paramilitary force was attacked by the FARC. "Right when we had contact
with guerrillas, which lasted three hours, an Army helicopter arrived,
and gave us medical supplies and munitions."(43)

Villalba admitted taking direct part in killings
and the mutilations of victims, including a beheading. Once the paramilitaries
had rounded up the cattle belonging to El Aro residents, Villalba said,
paramilitaries left the area protected by the Army, which advised them
to take a route that would avoid members of the Attorney General's office
and Procuradura they believed had been sent to investigate reports of the
massacre. While the paramilitaries traveled in several public busses commandeered
on the highway, another car preceded them, according to Villalba, ensuring
that the busses would pass army roadblocks unhampered.(44)

In statements to the press, Carlos Castaño took responsibility
for the massacre.(45)

Villalba also testified about numerous other operations
carried out jointly by paramilitaries and the Granaderos and Girardot Battalions.
A common practice, he told government investigators, was "legalization"
(legalización), when paramilitaries would give the corpses of suspected guerrillas or murdered civilians to the Army in exchange for weapons and
munitions. Villalba testified that soldiers then clothed the corpses in
military uniforms and claimed them publicly as guerrillas killed in combat.
"When we would deliver a guerrilla to the Girardot Battalion, they would
give us in exchange grenades and R-15 munitions... And after the Army received
(the corpse), they would dress it in a military uniform."(46)

Prosecutors told Human Rights Watch that they confirmed
this detail by reviewing Fourth Brigade records on weapons, which revealed
that many weapons issued to troops had vanished. Although the prosecutor
told Human Rights Watch that Fourth Brigade military officers had confirmed
that Granaderos Battalion stores had gone to paramilitaries, he claimed
that the Army never followed up on the investigation or punished anyone.(47)

As Villalba's testimony demonstrates, "legalization"
is one way officers can better their chances of receiving medals and promotions.
"The commander would give the order, and says that he wanted results, casualties
(bajas)," one former army officer told Human Rights Watch. "So anyone
who came near our patrol would be killed."(50)

Less than a month after former Armed Forces Commander
General Manuel Bonett told Human Rights Watch that the army had revised
the way it measured success, Gen. Iván Ramírez summarized the work of his First Division by releasing to the press long lists of people claimed killed
in action by his troops.(51)

This is the same officer whose visa to enter the
United States was reportedly revoked the grounds of "terrorist activity,"
in this case support for paramilitary groups. According to a Washington
Post investigation, Ramírez was a key intelligence source for the United
States and served as a liaison and paid informant for the Central Intelligence
Agency, supposedly to help the fight against drug traffickers and Marxist
guerrillas. At the same time, according to the report, he maintained close
ties to right-wing paramilitary groups who finance much of their activities
through drug trafficking.(52)

Far from subsiding, Attorney General investigations
gathered in compelling detail evidence on how illegal activity in the Fourth
Brigade continued in 1998 and 1999. Perhaps most notorious was the March
1999 murder of Alex Lopera, a former peace adviser to the Antioquia governor's
office. Lopera was assisting a family negotiate the release of a family
member kidnaped by guerrillas when he was stopped at an Army roadblock
near Sonsn, Antioquia.(53)

According to sworn testimony by "Valentín," a former
Fourth Brigade soldier and radio operator present at the scene, soldiers
from the Granaderos and Juan del Corral Battalions searched the car and
discovered the ransom money hidden in a spare tire. At the time, "Valentín"
told prosecutors, the commander of the Granaderos Battalion, Major David
Hernández Rojas, was present.(54)

Since there were no arrest warrants for any of the
car's occupants, "Valentín" testified, procedure dictated that soldiers
had to let the car proceed. However, according to "Valentín," Major Hernández first sent several soldiers ahead to ambush the car and steal the money.(55)

The soldiers, "Valentín" explained, had little choice.
"Hernández told all of us there to have a care, that whoever informed on
him would die, with every person in his family. He said that he had people
working for him that did that sort of work."(56)

Under the command of Capt. Diego Fernando Fino, "Valentín" said that he and two soldiers set up the ambush.(57)
"Valentín" testified to prosecutors that private Carlos Mario Escudero fired
the fatal shots, killing all three passengers at point blank range. The
ransom was divided up between the soldiers.(58)
The case came to light, however, when Escudero's wife reported his share
of the money stolen several weeks later according to Escudero's testimony
to government investigators.(59)

An internal investigation initiated by the Fourth
Brigade was easily deflected, according to "Valentín." "(Hernández) told all of the Granaderos soldiers how they should testify, and each one was
given a set thing to say."(60)

"Valentín" also testified about Major Hernández's close
ties with paramilitaries operating in eastern Antioquia.(61)
In one deposition, "Valentín" told investigators that Major Hernández told him and other subordinates that he had begun to organize a death squad
called "La Muerte" (Death) within the Fourth Brigade in coordination with
an army officer attached to the rural Gaula, a combined military-police
unit. The group was to be equipped and armed with camouflage uniforms,
guns, and munitions seized by soldiers from guerrillas.(62)

"Valentín" also told Attorney General investigators
that Major Jesús María Clavijo Clavijo, then commander of the "Héroes de Barbacoas" Battalion, worked with paramilitary groups.(63) Among the killings "Valentín" attributed to Major Clavijo working with paramilitaries were ones carried out near El Carmen de Atrato, Choc, in February 1999. "Normally, everywhere that Major Clavijo went, there were disappearances, murders, and wherever he was there was always a flood of reports of abuses," he told investigators in a sworn statement.(64)

According to "Valentín," Major Clavijo also "legalized" corpses delivered by paramilitaries. However, this system didn't work if a reward for a missing person was offered by family members. In one case,
"Valentín" testified that Major Clavijo ordered soldiers under his command
to dismember several corpses with chainsaws in order to foil identification.(65)

"Valentín," who was a radio operator, said he often
heard paramilitaries communicating with the Army in the field. "As I was
monitoring the communications, I heard people that were not part of the
Army talking about combat and requesting assistance, using other channels
than the ones we used, and I realized that these were the paramilitaries
by the way that they spoke... Major Abondano [of the Fourth Brigade] gave
orders to the troops using the radio, to advance, to follow the flank they
were on, because our 'cousins' were in combat and needed help."(66)

This witness also linked other Fourth Brigade officers,
including Major Clavijo, Col. Rivillas, Major Abondano and others to paramilitaries
through regular meetings held on military bases, He said that officers
attached to the "Pedro Nel Ospina" Battalion also took part in support
for paramilitaries.(67)

Clavijo's name also surfaced in Attorney General
investigations of alleged Army coordination with CONVIVIRs, groups of civilians
authorized by the government to carry out war-related activities. In practice,
they differed little from illegal paramilitary groups. In 1997, José Alirio
Arcila, the leader of an Antioquia CONVIVIR known as "Los Sables" implicated
Clavijo and other Fourth Brigade officers in a series of murders in Medellín.
However, Human Rights Watch is not aware of any on-going investigations
of the security force officers named by Arcila.(70)

Nevertheless, Major Clavijo, for example, has since
been promoted to colonel and is now commander of the "Hroes de Majagual"
Battalion under the jurisdiction of the Fifth Brigade and based in Barrancabermeja.
Most recently, this battalion has been linked in the press to an increase
in paramilitary activity and direct attacks on the civilian population
near Cantagallo, Santander. In November 1999, for example, local farmers
charged that troops under Clavijo's direct command had coordinated with
paramilitaries to seize two noted leaders of displaced people, Gildardo
Fuentes and Edgar Quiroga.(71) As of this
writing, they remain "disappeared."

The following January, the Peasant Association of
the Cimitarra River Valley told local authorities that Clavijo's men were
carrying out so-called "anti-drug operations" by attacking civilians along
the Cimitarra River. In addition, they claimed that Colombian Navy patrol
boats fired on civilian dwellings in the villages of La Victoria, Coroncoro,
and Yanacu starting on January 16.(72)
Over 150 people fled to Barrancabermeja for safety.(73)

For his part, Major Hernández was arrested, but later,
government investigators told Human Rights Watch, was allowed to escape
by soldiers under the command of Fourth Brigade Brig. Gen. Eduardo Herrera
Verbel.(74) The Colombian press has reported
that Hernández now works with the ACCU.(75)
Indeed, "Valentín" told government investigators that the officer told his
subordinates that he would work for the paramilitaries if he was investigated
by the Attorney General's office, since the ACCU had already offered him
a car, a ranch, and a high salary.(76)

So far, impunity has been the result of official
investigations. The prosecutors and investigators assigned to the case
have either recused themselves out of fear or fled Colombia because of
threats. One prosecutor told Human Rights Watch that he received credible
information indicating that Major Hernández had paid La Terraza the equivalent
of $7,000 for his life.(77)

I signed one case to authorize an indictment
of paramilitaries before lunch, and by the time I returned to my desk after
eating, a death threat, hand delivered, was there, with intimate details
about the decor of my apartment to let me know the killers had already
been inside.

Colombian prosecutor

Attorney General and other investigators said in
interviews with Human Rights Watch that they believe that the group behind
a series of assassinations and terror campaigns over the last three years
has been military intelligence. Although the Twentieth Brigade, which centralized
military intelligence, was officially dismantled in 1998 and intelligence
units supposedly lost their ability to mount operations, evidence strongly
suggests that agents were simply redistributed to intelligence units in
existing brigades and battalions. Human Rights Watch has obtained information
indicating that intelligence units continue to mount operations where human
rights are violated.

The United States trains Colombian Army intelligence
officers, but has not provided information publicly about what units they
belong to. In FY 1999, for example, the United Sates trained four Air Force
intelligence officers and two Army intelligence officers. In FY 1998, the
U.S. trained six Army intelligence officers: four were stationed in intelligence
headquarters in Bogotá, one was stationed in San Jos&eacuteé del Guaviare, and one was stationed in the city of Santa Marta.(78)

In one of at least five similar cases, Attorney General
investigators linked the 1998 kidnaping and later murder of Benjamin Khoudari,
an Israeli businessman, to Thirteenth Brigade intelligence officers. According
to the official indictment, Col. Jorge Plazas Acevedo planned and carried
out a series of kidnapping for ransom and murder, including Khoudari's,
as head of the intelligence unit.(79) In
1999, Plazas was retired from active duty and his case is now before a
civilian court.(80)

Even after Acevedo's arrest, government investigators
continue to link the Thirteenth Brigade to threats against human rights
defenders. "The Thirteenth Brigade remains in crisis," a top government
investigator told Human Rights Watch in October 1999.(81)

Surveillance believed to be carried out by military
intelligence of human rights groups is open, aggressive, and threatening.
One Bogotá group reported being filmed and photographed from a neighboring
hotel. Many of the telephones used by human rights groups are openly tapped.
Threats are daily occurrences. One office manager told Human Rights Watch
that when they are trying to distribute an urgent action, the phone line
is cut, preventing them from sending it via email or fax. Also, when they
call out, they are frequently connected directly to the Thirteenth Brigade.(82)

In some killings -- like that of the CINEP workers
in 1997 and Antioquia human rights defender Valle in 1998 - evidence gathered
by government investigators strongly suggests that military intelligence
acted in coordination with Carlos Castaño. Since Castaño has no force capable
of operating in cities, he will contract out murders to La Terraza.(83)

According to government investigators, Castaño pays
La Terraza a monthly retainer. Once a target is identified and a "contract"
is negotiated with La Terraza, investigators believe, the killers are given
intelligence gathered by the military on the target's whereabouts and movements.
Killers are able to travel throughout Colombia, and typically work in pairs.
The pair, mounted on a motorcycle, will follow and intended victim until
they are ready to carry out an attack.(84)

Government investigators have also tied La Terraza
to both the Popular Training Institute (Instituto Popular de Capacitación,
IPC) and Senator Piedad Córdoba kidnapings, which they believe were carried
out on Castaño's orders. Witnesses have sworn under oath that they recognized among the gunmen the La Terraza leader, Alexander Londoño, alias "El Zarco."(85)
The most recent killing being investigated in association with La Terraza
and its ties to military intelligence is that of Jaime Garzón, the humorist.
A suspected La Terraza gunmen was arrested in Colombia in January 1999
in connection with the Garzón murder.(86)

Government investigators told Human Rights Watch
that the intelligence system maintained by La Terraza is excellent and
national in scope. They depend in part on fleets of taxis to collect intelligence,
and have been linked to death threats against government investigators,
including members of the Technical Investigations Unit (Cuerpo Técnico de
Investigaciones, CTI) .(87)

One prosecutor told Human Rights Watch, "I signed
one case to authorize an indictment of paramilitaries before lunch, and
by the time I returned to my desk after eating, a death threat, hand delivered,
was there, with intimate details about the decor of my apartment to let
me know the killers had already been inside."(88)

Some formal investigations into key paramilitary
leaders and their relationships to the military and La Terraza are made
virtually impossible by these types of threats and the lack of protection
for prosecutors, investigators, and key witnesses. In 1998 and 1999, a
dozen CTI officials were murdered or forced to resign because of threats
related to their work on human rights cases. Others have left the country
in fear for their lives.(89)

Government investigators told Human Rights Watch
that among the cases most damaged by La Terraza threats is the investigation
into the murder of human rights defender Valle. One CTI agent investigating
Valle's murder was killed soon after the murder. The prosecutor investigating
the case fled Colombia. Another CTI investigator was killed in September
1999.(90)

The Thirteenth Brigade was also linked to the May
1998 seizure by authorities of the offices of the Intercongregational Commission
on Justice and Peace, a respected human rights group. After retired general
and former defense minister Fernando Landazbal was assassinated in Santafé
de Bogotá on May 12, 1998, the Twentieth Brigade supplied information to
the Attorney General's office linking the crime to activities that took
place within Justice and Peace. The following day, Thirteenth Brigade soldiers
seized the offices.(91)

Soldiers concentrated their search on the office
of "Nunca Más," a research project that is collecting information on crimes
against humanity. Soldiers forced employees to kneel at gun point in order
to take their pictures, a gesture apparently meant to evoke a summary execution.
During the search, soldiers addressed employees as "guerrillas" and filmed
them and documents in the office. At one point, soldiers told the employees
that they wanted precise details of the office in order to later construct
a scale model, apparently to plan further incursions. After human rights
defenders gathered outside out of concern, soldiers set up a camera to
film them, an act of intimidation.(92)

In a recorded statement to the Colombian radio, Colombia's
assistant attorney general, Jaime Córdoba Triviño, confirmed that the search was prompted by "military intelligence, which gave us a report that indicated that there were people associated with the ELN at this location . . . but
once the prosecutors realized that this was an error, they suspended the
operation."(93) In later reports, Attorney
General Alfonso Gómez claimed that the Army had purposefully hidden the
true nature of the work done at Justice and Peace from investigators.(94)

Its Americas division was established in
1981 to monitor human rights in Latin America and the Caribbean. José
Miguel Vivanco is executive director; Joanne Mariner is deputy director; Joel Solomon is research director; Sebastian Brett and Robin Kirk are research associates; Monisha Bajaj and Barbara Graves are associates. Stephen L.
Kass is chair of the advisory committee; Marina Pinto Kaufman and David
E. Nachman are vice chairs.

Web Site Address: http://www.hrw.org

Listserv address: To subscribe to the list,
send an e-mail message to majordomo@igc.apc.org with "subscribe hrw-news"
in the body of the message (leave the subject line blank).

1. Canal is listed as having trained at the School
of the Americas in cadet orientation C-3 from Nov. 7-Nov. 21, 1980.

2. The name of "Elias" has been changed for security
reasons. Human Rights Watch interview with "Elias," January 15, 2000.

3. The division includes units operating in the department
of Putumayo, among them the 24th Brigade.

4. The ELN claimed in a statement that among the
hostages were individuals wanted for drug trafficking by U.S. law enforcement,
an affirmation that was never confirmed. Human Rights Watch interview with
Attorney General investigator, January 14, 2000; "Los guerrilleros del
Eln se tomaron por asalto la iglesia La María; rescatadas 75 personas,"
El Tiempo, May 31, 1999; and "ELN says its hostages include people
wanted by US for drug trafficking," Agence France Presse, August
23, 1999.

7. For example, Human Rights Watch obtained much
of the cable traffic generated by the embassy and related to the activities
of "Los Tangueros," a paramilitary group led by former Medellín Cartel member Fidel Castaño, through a Freedom of Information Act request.

14. Information about the Calima Front also circulated
in press reports as early as August. Human Rights Watch interview with
independent investigator, October 2, 1999; and "Colombia Death Squad Said
To Plot Against Peace," Karl Penhaul, Reuters, August 15, 1999.

26. For a summary of this on-going case, see Comisión de Investigación de los Sucesos Violentos de Trujillo: Caso 11.007 de la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos (Santafé de Bogotá: Consejera
presidencial para los Derechos Humanos de la República de Colombia, August 1995).

27. Gen. Rafael Hernández, reportedly Colombia's
military attache in Chile, was then commander of the Third Brigade. As
the primary trial court judge, he acquitted his subordinate, Lt. Col. Luis
Becerra Bohórquez, despite compelling evidence of the officer's guilt. Becerra was eventually dismissed from the army. This was not the first atrocity
Becerra committed as an Army officer. As the Tenth Brigade intelligence
chief, he also helped arrange the 1988 massacres of banana workers in Antioquia's
"Honduras" and "La Negra" farms. In October 1998, a military tribunal that
had convened to review the Riofrío case ruled that Becerra and two other
soldiers were guilty of the crime of "encubrimiento por favorecimiento,"
in essence concluding that the officers had erred only by protecting themselves
by reporting the incident as combat with a guerrilla unit, not the massacre
of unarmed civilians. However, the sentence meted out was laughable - twelve
months in jail, less than a month per victim. Indeed, Becerra was never
incarcerated. Becerra was killed by an unknown gunman in a Cali restaurant
on February 14, 1999. For a summary of the case, see Massacre in Riofro
((Santafé de Bogotá: Commission of Non-governmental organizations).

33. This wasn't the first time the ACCU entered
this area. In 1996, the group murdered three people in the hamlets of El
Inglés and La Granja. Human Rights Watch interview with Attorney General
investigator, Medellín, Antioquia, July 2, 1996.

39. Government investigators told Human Rights Watch
that La Terraza is descended from the groups that worked on contract for
drug kingpin Pablo Escobar in the 1980s. Testimony of Francisco Enrique
Villalba Hernández to the Attorney General's office, April 30, 1998; and
Human Rights Watch interview with Attorney General investigator, October
2, 1999.

40. Authorities told Human Rights Watch that Salvatore
Mancuso Gómez is Carlos Castaño's operational chief within the ACCU. The Attorney General has issued at least two warrants for his arrest related
to paramilitary activity and kidnapping. Report on outstanding arrest
warrants, Attorney General's office, January 1, 1998.

50. Human Rights Watch interview with former army
officer, Santafé de Bogotá, November 12, 1995.

51. Gen. Ramírez retired from the service in 1999.
Tonny Pérez Mier, "Balance de I División del Ejército," El Tiempo, December 23, 1997; Human Rights Watch interview with General Bonett, Santafé de Bogotá, December 12, 1997.

52. "Colombian Army's Third in Command Allegedly
Led Two Lives: General Reportedly Served as a Key CIA Informant While Maintaining
Ties to Death Squads Financed by Drug Traffickers," Douglas Farah and Laura
Brooks, Washington Post, August 11, 1998.

54. Hernández is listed as having trained twice at
the School of the Americas. As a cadet, he took the orientation for combat
weapons from March 7-April 19, 1985. As a lieutenant, he trained in "psychological
operations" from February 27-May 15, 1991. For safety reasons, we have
changed the name of this witness. Testimony by "Valentín" to the Attorney
General's office, June 22, 1999.

67. Testimony by "Valentín" to the Attorney General's
office, June 1, 1999.

68. Cortés is listed as having studied in the course
on weapons orientation for cadets (C-3) at the School of the Americas from
January 12-26, 1984.

69. Office of Special Investigations-Antioquia region,
Report, September 21, 1998.

70. Arcila directed a CONVIVIR, an association of
civilians authorized by the government to take part in intelligence-gathering
and other activities. Sentencia Anticipada, 3687- (F 21.336), Juzgado Regional
de Medellín, August 8, 1997.

78. U.S. Department of Defense and Department of
State, "Foreign Military Training & DOD Engagement Activities of Interest:
A Report to Congress for Fiscal Years 1998 and 1999," (Section 581 Report),
CD-ROM, 1999.

79. Plazas reportedly attended the School of the
Americas and took a course on Small Unit Infantry Tactics from Jan. 24-March
4, 1977. Human Rights Watch interview with Attorney General investigator,
October 5, 1999.

91. The link between the information supplied by
the Twentieth Brigade and the use made of it by the Thirteenth Brigade
was confirmed in government investigations contained in a subsequent Procuradura
investigation completed on December 18, 1998. Public Statement, Justice
and Peace, May 19, 1998; and "Ejercito busca al ELN en una casa de Paz,"
El Espectador, May 14, 1998.